


it was my secret (but I wish I would have shared)

by sororexitium



Category: Practical Magic (1998), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Gen, I do not even know, Pepper-centric, Platonic Soulmates, i shouldn't write while watching movies, sad ending is sad, this started when I watched Practical Magic while writing for the Avengers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-07
Updated: 2012-08-07
Packaged: 2017-11-11 15:03:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,699
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/479781
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sororexitium/pseuds/sororexitium
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I wish you hadn’t taken your father’s name,” Gillian said when she was going to college. “You’re an Owens through and through…not a Potts. God, that name is awful. Virginia Potts…” She made a face at the name and sat in the seat at her desk where she lit the cigarette that had been in her hand for the better part of ten minutes, unlit. “Virginia Owens is so much…more you.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	it was my secret (but I wish I would have shared)

**Author's Note:**

> I have...no clue at all why this happened. I was writing on 'my universe will never be the same (I'm glad you came)' while watching Practical Magic and before I know it, Pepper is Gillian's daughter and this thing covered my screen. I'm trying to understand it, but my brain is like, 'Do not question; only obey' and I'm like...Okay! 
> 
> This is in no order at all. This is basically me being a fucking freak. Have fun! And if you feel the need to shoot me...I understand.

“I wish you hadn’t taken your father’s name,” Gillian said when she was going to college. “You’re an Owens through and through…not a Potts. God, that name is awful. Virginia Potts…” She made a face at the name and sat in the seat at her desk where she lit the cigarette that had been in her hand for the better part of ten minutes, unlit. “Virginia Owens is so much…more you.”

She ignored her, pausing in the middle of her room with a clipboard in her hand a checklist in front of her nose. She went down the list meticulously, like she would if she was making a potion instead of packing for dorm life. A potion would probably be easier for her. Sighing, she went to her closet to pull out some hangers for her suits, the two she had.

Gillian, her mother, stopped her with an arm around her waist, pulling her into her lap. She had always been the affectionate one out of everyone in the house. Very handsy, always grabbing for hugs and cuddling in the mornings. Attention starved, the Aunts sometimes whispered drunkenly when everyone else was supposed to be sleeping. She didn’t understand how. The Aunts adored all the children equally, and Aunt Sally was hopelessly devoted to her sister.

“Come on, Peppermint Patty. There’s gotta be some sweet underneath all that cool,” she said. “I know you can’t still be mad for that little relaxation potion. It was to help you loosen up for your interview with the advisor…”

Virginia, or Pepper as she preferred to be called, glared at her mother for a moment before taking the cigarette from her hand and snuffing it with a practiced motion before dropping into the mostly full garbage bin. Gillian smiled guiltily with a small shrug. “I know I said I’d quit…”

Pepper huffed and stood from her mother’s lap, going over to her closet as had been her original mission. “You’ve been saying that since I was old enough to know smoking is bad for you. Probably since before, knowing Aunt Sally.”

Gillian smiled, curling into a ball in the seat and wrapping her arms around her legs in the absence of her daughter. “You know me well, Pepper.”

She smiled back, maybe feeling a little guilty for giving her mother her famous cold shoulder. “Of course, I do. You’re my mom.”

When she left the next morning headed on a ferry to the mainland, all of her family was there to see her off. Antonia looked tearful, as she hugged her goodbye. The Aunts and Aunt Sally gave her encouraging advice and told her to be back for the holidays and the Solstice Celebrations (although that one is more from the Aunts than Aunt Sally). Her mother and father were together for once, perhaps in the makings of another ‘on-again’ period and her father said that he was proud of her.

When her mother hugged her for the last time, she pulled her to arms length and said with a strange sad and mischievous smile, “You still would look better as an Owens, but I suppose Potts suits you a little.”

Her father had squawked indignantly, but she smiled at her mother’s small blessing for her to be what and who she wanted, away from the Owens family.

*

Growing up in the Owens house was always a lesson in the abnormal. Having Gillian Owens as her mother had meant that abnormal was a polite way of putting her childhood. Gilly was a mixture of the Aunts and her own past experiences and she put all of those eccentricities to work on her daughter.

She supposed it was about the same for Kylie and Antonia, since they all lived under the same roof.

But Sally never got them up in the middle of the night when school was in session because she wanted to go see Salem. Sally didn’t get them up to make brownies in the middle of the night and then cuddle up with her kids on the couch. Kylie and Antonia were nine and eleven years older than her, but by the time Pepper was ten, they always said they kind of wished they had grown up with Gilly around more.

Pepper sometimes hated thinking this, but she sometimes wished Gilly was around less. She never said this to her cousins, or to any of her aunts, yet sometimes she thought Gilly knew it. Her mom would sometimes get this sad look in her eye when Pepper would give her the brush off.

Those weeks she usually found herself with her father, and though Simon and Gilly were on half-good terms, she didn’t come around until Mondays to pick her up from school. Pepper would sometimes try to make it up to her mom, for being so hateful, but most times she sat at the table and finished her homework, and then after she would look through the family spell book, make a potion or a tincture. Sometimes she would practice some magic with the Aunts.

They said she had talent. They said she was a natural.

Gilly smiled proudly every time, and Pepper knew she was proud, but Pepper sometimes just wanted her to congratulate her on her grades, which she kept up despite frequent interruptions to her sleep pattern and random trips to somewhere Gilly just _had_ to see.

*

When she had her interview at Stark Industries, she didn’t tell her family. She didn’t think that they would really know what Stark Industries was, but they were a small town family and large corporations tended to be frowned upon. Gilly didn’t mind them much, but there were some things that hadn’t gone over well with her when she was away before Pepper was born.

She was directed by the receptionist up to the third floor, and into chair to sit. She waited for thirty minutes before someone came out to greet her, and older man with a large beard. She felt ill at ease immediately, his aura harsh and soft at the same time, alternately battering and messaging her senses. She knew not to trust him, and for a moment wondered if it was too late to walk away before scolding herself. Not every aura would be soft and clean. She couldn’t let this chance go to waste.

She stood from her chair, and offered her hand with a pleasant enough smile. “Hello. I’m here to see Mr. Stark.”

He returned her smile as he took her hand. “Sadly, I’m not him,” he said. “Obidiah Stane. I’m sorry for Tony’s absence. He should be somewhere around here, so…let’s see if we can find him.”

He turned to lead the way, and she pursed her lips momentarily, trying to push her irritation down as she quickly took the step beside him. She expected her to lead him to an office, but instead they were back in the elevator and heading down a few floors, Mr. Stane making small talk with her the entire time.

“So…you’re…? I’m sorry. I didn’t check Tony’s itinerary for today. I don’t know which interviewer you are.”

“I’m Virginia Potts,” she returned, her gaze forward on the polished metal doors.

“Virginia! That’s a beautiful name. Suiting for a beautiful woman.”

She gave him a tight smile, her skin crawling just a little. She was relieved when the door opened, but still non-plussed to be in some sort of laboratory.

“Tony!” Mr. Stane called out and a nearby worker pointed towards the back with an exasperated look on her face. Pepper honestly shared the sentiment. A busy body boss was usually very annoying. She had had several in her career life.

However, when she was led over, she saw not a busy body or a hoverer. She saw another worker. He didn’t have a lab coat on, but he was dressed in slacks and his sleeves were rolled up with his hands buried wrist deep in wiring.

“Tony! You have an appointment with a Ms. Potts,” Stane admonished, snapping his fingers in front of Tony’s face to gather his attention.

The man, obviously Tony Stark, jumped a little, blinking owlishly at Stane before checking his watch. “Damn…I didn’t mean to be down here this long. She hasn’t gone yet has she? I looked her up and she sounds perfect. Really, I’ve practically already made up my mind. This is just for posterity so the board doesn’t chew me out like they did when I hired Happy.”

He looked to be a little younger than she was, and he spoke fast as he wiped his hands on his pants with no regard for them at all.

Mr. Stane sighed like an exasperated parent. “You burnt your tie too.”

“I don’t give a damn about the tie. Oh, hi! Are you…? You’re Pepper Potts, right? Please be Pepper Potts,” he said upon seeing her standing there. “I didn’t mean to blow you off. I lost track of time.”

“It’s fine,” she assured him handing him a nearby cloth when he offered his hand to her. He wasn’t very greasy, but there was debris and some blood on his hand where he had cut himself on the wires. He took it with a small self-conscious nod. “I suppose this will be the part when you tell me general hours and duties…since I apparently already have the job.”

He smiled, still a boyish smile yet already tarnished, bruised. His aura was kind, gentle, but felt ragged against hers. More than that, his aura felt welcome. Like family. “Yeah, this is basically just posterity. Did a background on you and found no malicious connections; no reason to worry about you stealing company secrets or integrating faulty systems into mine, not that that’s possible, but some people have tried.”

“You must have dug pretty deep.”

“All the way home. You used to go by your mother’s maiden name.”

Pepper felt a small smile pull her lips. “That’s a lot of digging.”

*

When Pepper was six, her mom had a miscarriage. She didn’t remember much of those days. Her early years were sometimes hard to place, but she remembered Aunt Sally waking her up for school when Gilly was in the hospital. She remembered that for three days her mother had sat in front of her rooms fire place and that her dad was always there, despite the fact that she heard Uncle Gary say, ‘You’re a good man for taking care of her. For loving her enough to see passed the fact that this girl wasn’t yours.’

She remembered hearing her dad say, “You look after Kylie and Antonia, because you love them and their mother. I would have loved this one too.”

She didn’t remember the Aunts making potions to help Gilly with depression. She just remembers her parents. Simon was always there for Gilly, and Gilly…Mom made her stay home for two weeks, as if afraid to let her out of sight. She carried her everywhere and slept with her at night. She remembered that her mom looked into the fireplace a lot, and she twisted a crystal over the map so many times it must have been burned into her eyes every time it landed in New York.

*

Kylie got married a year and a half after Pepper began working for Tony and she was required to go as she was one of the bridesmaids. She left Tony alone, and fretted over her friend the entire time, because he was getting pretty bad. Each month more alcohol consumed, became more loose, consumed more drugs, and slept less.

While she was home she gathered some more belladonna from the gardens for him, and looked up a spell to help him sleep longer and more fulfilling nights…or days, whenever  she could bring him coffee and spike it enough for him to pass out.

Gilly flocked around her as did her dad, Simon, both of them glad to have her home, but she kept finding excuses to talk to Kylie and Antonia. She was the last Owens woman who had yet to wed or even consider having a family. Kylie had wed while Pepper was still in college and had two beautiful little girls and another on the way.

“Do you listen for the Death Watch Beetle?” Antonia teased, because their mothers had broken Maria’s spell.

No need to worry anymore.

It was a joke to them, but Pepper knew that Aunt Sally and even her own mom jumped when they heard a noise to similar to that of the Beetle. Pepper didn’t know how they joked about it, when it still haunted them with the absence of their father. Even though Uncle Gary was a good father to them, on Michael’s birthday, they still went out to his grave, and she knew they cried every time.

But Kylie laughed and said, “Only when he pisses me off.”

Pepper looked over at her mother and father, who were currently seeing other people but still gravitated towards each other like a moth to flame. Pepper knew Gilly loved her father nearly as much as she loved Aunt Sally. She knew she listened for the Death Watch Beetle.

*

In her spare time, Pepper still practiced. She would blow fire to life on all the candles in her bathroom. She would make sleeping potions in her kitchen; do simple spells on herself to keep herself from losing her temper when she had a headache. She had stashes of belladonna that she kept for when Tony was working on three days straight without sleep and he needed that push to send him to sleep. She had some of her jewelry customized, because although she wasn’t as superstitious as her family, she knew that bad omens were out there, and she tried to ward them off as much as she could.

*

One day, Tony cut his hand, opened his palm right up, and Pepper, desperate after Afghanistan, Iron Man, and so many other things, cut her palm too, before pressing it to his.

He didn’t know the incantation, but she whispered it to herself as she felt their blood mingle. Perhaps not blood related, but he was her family.

*

Gilly came to visit her at college randomly as did her dad. Sometimes Kylie and Antonia would come see her, but all of her aunts stayed on the island. Her mother always made sure to visit at least once a month when she was in North Carolina. She was the highlight of every guy’s month, because even at forty-five she looked young and beautiful.

The Owens women always age slowly, live longer. Aunt Jet and Aunt Fran were nearly ninety years old…and hardly looked fifty-five and moved like they were still in their thirties.

Her mom asked her about her classes, but not about spells or potions. She gave her some herbs for various aches and pains every time she came to her dorm, and then she whisked Pepper off to go to parties, to bars with a fake ID she had procured from an old friend. They danced under the full moon a few times after a final, before Gilly drove her home. They were always clothed though.

When Gilly was in North Carolina, she always rented a hotel and she would make Pepper stay with her, cuddled close in the same bed while her mom told her about the gossip of the town and stroked her short hair that she had cut after two months of living away from home. It made everyone in the family sad to see her long strawberry blond hair around her shoulders, instead of swaying around her hips as it had done most of her life.

“You’ve become even more independent than I ever was,” she said one time while they were in her bed. “You’ve stopped being an Owens woman all together, you know that?”

Pepper, a little drunk and for once glad to be in her mother’s arms, said, “I’ll always be your daughter though.”

*

Tony tried to treat her respectably when she was first hired on. He still called her Pepper, instead of Ms. Potts most days, but if he worked late, he let her go at four. If she worked late with him, he brought in coffee and food, making sure he had her favorite before he ordered.

When he was young, he tried very hard to be attentive of her. It seemed the older he became though, the more brilliant he seemed to be and more and more things were pushed out of his mind until she was chasing him all over L.A.

Once she accidentally called him, “Gilly.”

He had laughed at her and demanded, “You call your mom by her name!?”

The argument was all but over as she pressed her hand to her face to smother her smile. “Only when I’m angry at her.”

“Fuck. I should count myself so lucky to be able to piss you off as much as your mom.”

They had been young only in their twenties, but Pepper had smiled and reached out to touch his forearm. “You’re practically family to me, Tony. You have to know that by now.”

His expression was guarded a little, still not completely sure how to react to the ‘threat’ of family, but he had nodded before heading down to his in home lab to build something brilliant.

*

When Tony was taken in Afghanistan, she called her mom in tears as soon as she got home.

She didn’t hear the Death Watch Beetle, but she felt something plummet in her stomach. She talks to her mom as she pulls out a world map, knowing it may be futile, but she knew the country he was in, and she circled the crystal around the Middle East just to make sure. It landed in the country she expected, so she went out and ordered a map of Afghanistan to spread across her table.

Her mother arrived with Aunt Sally and Antonia by the time she received the map two days later and together the four of them concentrated on finding Tony. The crystal landed, and Pepper sent the intel through the different channels she had picked up while living in L.A. until she was sure Rhodey received them.

Gilly stayed with her until Tony was found, and instead of her pulling Pepper into a close embrace, Pepper pulled her mom in, burrowing against her side, and refusing to sleep unless her mom was in the bed with her.

“Do you love him?” her mom asked one night.

“I’m not in love with him,” she said, because she wasn’t. She loved him dearly, probably as much as she ever expected to love any man, but she wasn’t in love with him. “He’s just…he’s my best friend…and I can’t stand the thought of not having him.”

Gilly ran her hand through Pepper’s hair, stroking her ear comfortingly. “He’s alive, Peppermint Patty. You know he is. The crystal wouldn’t fall every night otherwise.”

She nodded, but still felt the tears burning hot behind her eyes.

*

Gilly called her one night, scared and crying.

The Death Watch Beetle had come again.

The next week she attended the funeral of her father. Her mom didn’t go, but they did shots together afterwards while practicing spells and potions. Aunt Jet and Aunt Fran dragged them out to dance under the stars, and Aunt Sally, Kylie, and Antonia built a blanket fort, where they all huddled and eventually fell asleep.

Pepper didn’t cry until she was back in L.A.

*

“I hate magic,” Tony declared one day after he had yet again fought with a sorcerer. Their attempt at a relationship was long since over, but she still lived in Stark Tower, still went where he went as a friend, even though she ran his company. She had to leave New York City often, but home was in Stark Tower where Tony and the rest of the Avengers were.

She had smiled at him sadly as he threw himself into a rant about magic, banging around the living room with schematics for a new suit everywhere around him. She didn’t bother to stop stirring her coffee…even though she was doing it without her hand. He had never noticed when she did it other time. It would be fine now.

“I know, Tony. Magic is the source of all evil.”

*

At the end of all things, she went home when Tony died. Aunt Jet and Aunt Fran had chocolate cake for her. Aunt Sally and Uncle Gary had prepared her room. Antonia and Kylie came over with their families.

But it was her mother who stayed with her. It was always mom who stayed with her.

“I never heard the Beetle,” Pepper said, because that seemed to mean something right now. “But I feel like I’m halfway gone.”

“You remember when you were six?” Gilly asked, letting her hand run through Pepper’s steadily growing hair, almost down to her lower back again for the first time since she was eighteen. “I had that miscarriage.”

Pepper didn’t remember it well, but she remembered that month; how magic had bled from her mother and she had refused to let Pepper go to school for two weeks so that they could play together, while at nights Gilly curled around her. She remembered her dad being there a lot, even though Pepper was sure that the baby hadn’t been his.

She nodded anyway.

“I sometimes thought that he got your little sister’s soul. I think that’s why you felt so connected to him.”

Pepper stared at her, feeling pitiful and cold. “Then shouldn’t we have died on the same day?”

Gilly shook her head. “Sometimes…fate doesn’t work like that.”

Pepper looked at the scar on her hand, the one from when she had shared her blood with Tony. She traced along the thin line and her mom watched her, her own hand coming up to show her own scar.

“He did it to save you, Pepper. He did it for you.”


End file.
